


Like Breathing

by sprx77



Series: Askbox Games [3]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Dai-nana-han | Team 7 (Naruto) Feels, Everyone Is Gay, Fix-It, Ino and Mandatory Yamanaka Post-War Therapy, Multi, Naruto Epilogue What Epilogue
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-22
Updated: 2018-06-22
Packaged: 2019-05-26 22:36:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15010910
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sprx77/pseuds/sprx77
Summary: In which Sasuke and Sakura are way too gay to marry each other, Naruto realizes life isn't like an Icha-Icha novel in that the hero doesn'thaveto get the girl, post-war Yamanaka Therapy is mandated, and team sevenworks. In more or less that order.





	Like Breathing

**Author's Note:**

> A tumblr drabble I forgot to post.
> 
> Prompt: 37. “I’m not okay if you’re not okay.” (SasuNaruSaku? Or SasuNaru if you'd rather) ahhh, thank you for doing that valentines ask <3 I already sent one, but I wasn't sure if another would be ok <3 
> 
> A short thing because prompts.

“I’m not okay if you’re not okay,” Hinata finally said, voice breaking halfway through. She cleared her throat, smiled painfully. “Also, I need to learn and experience independence before settling into a relationship. I have a lot of not-good behaviors leftover from my childhood and need to develop a solid sense of self, otherwise things won’t really be  _healthy_  between us. Pretty much ever. And I think I want to join ANBU.”

Naruto stared at her, heart racing and chest feeling like someone was sitting on it. It wasn’t a panic attack but it was  _close_.

He couldn’t manage a smile but he did squint at her.

“Ino and Mandatory Yamanaka Post-War Therapy?”

“Ino and Mandatory Yamanaka Post-War Therapy.” Hinata agrees. It was what got them out here talking about this to start with, how Naruto needed to tell her about this and his misgivings and was so goddamn scared to broach the subject.

“I’m also pretty sure your feelings for me were just extremely platonic bordering on familial because you hadn’t really gotten affection as a child and latched onto me,” Naruto says, thoughtfully. It’s obviously repeated from a therapist, or paraphrased at the least. He hurriedly raises his hands. “Not that I’m telling you how  _you_  feel, or anything! You know what you’re feeling better than I do.”

“No, that’s pretty valid. I’ll always love you, but I’m slowly realizing it’s not  _that_  kind of love. Not what you feel for  _them_.”

And it should be sadness, or regret, or anything else but  _stark relief_  when she pats his head and smiles and jumps off to a nearby rooftop.

They’d been flirting with something really unhealthy, codependent and generally bad for both of their emotional needs out of an in-hindsight misplaced sense of obligation.

Phew.

Naruto hopped to the roofs himself, heading in the opposite direction. Freedom from obligation buoyed like a balloon in his chest, rising and rising until he felt like he could fly.

So much had his speed grown in the training before and during the fourth war that he made it to his destination in seconds instead of minutes.

And when he knocked, Sakura answered the door.

She saw him standing there, the weirdly hesitant yet happy smile on his face.

“Oh thank God.” Sakura breathed. “It was never going to work without you. I mean, can you imagine? I’m not meant to be a fucking house wife.”

“Team seven  _works_.” Naruto agreed, grinning feverishly at her.

“Hey, Sasuke!” Naruto shouts, wandering into their new apartment. “I didn’t want you to come back so you could be miserable and sign your life away to some out-of-place sense of duty! You’re supposed to be  _happy_.”

“Idiot.” Sasuke says reflexively, brushing a hand through his hair. He goes from looking uncomfortable on the  _couch_  in a very domestic living room of a  _couple_ , to lounging like a member of a team where they all trust each other and can be theirselves. “As if I could ever be  _happy_  without  _you_.”

It comes out as more an accusation than anything. Naruto can’t stop smiling. He hikes a leg over and settles into Sasuke’s lap, touches their foreheads together.

Being able to touch him without violence has been his goal since before he can remember—back when he was in the single digits.

“Good news, asshole.” Sakura grins, and it’s a grin that wants to be bloody. Sasuke looks startled, then laughs.

“Thank  _god_. Your crush on me died and now you just want to fuck me and then maybe punch me in the face, right? Please tell me Ino was right. I really can’t handle this otherwise.”

“Ino is  _always_  right and while I love both of you, I’m not marrying either one of you. If anything, I’m going to occasionally sleep with you both, enjoy living with you, and maybe ask Ino out on a date because have you  _seen_  her, lately?”

“Have you seen her ever?” Naruto deadpans back.

Sakura nods, like,  _exactly_.

Sasuke relaxes all over, buries his face into Naruto’s neck.

“I’m so unspeakably glad we can just be a ragtag team and figure ourselves out in our twenties instead of, like, getting married just because the war is over and we feel like we should.”

“I would literally never forgive Obito for starting that shit if that’s the result we had to deal with.” Naruto agrees. He’s almost dizzy with relief. Sasuke is pressed close, Sakura is sprawled over the couch, and even Kakashi sensei is happy somewhere with the aforementioned Uchiha probably giving him all different kinds of head, judging by the sounds they heard last time they went by the Hatake properties.

“Do you feel like we just dodged a wind-powered kunai?” Naruto asks, thinking of the dread that had pooled in his gut and grown every time he came home to his old apartment and found Hinata there, with dinner.

He shudders.

“Yes.” Sakura and Sasuke chorus, staring at each other with something like ‘I’m too gay for a monogamous straight relationship’ and no small bit of disgust on their faces.

“Good. Same.” A few beats pass. Sasuke shows no signs of letting him go. Naruto is sure as hell not going to be the one who pulls away from  _that_  first.

“If you two aren’t going to fuck on the couch, there’s a movie I’ve been wanting to watch.” Sakura announces.

Naruto perks up.

“Oh?”

Sasuke snorts.

“Who the hell managed to make and film and produce a movie during all that shit?” He grumbles, but not with disinterest.

Sakura laughs.

“So, apparently the Land of Spring was far enough away to avoid literally everything to do with the war and Fujikaze Yukie just put out a new smash hit.” She waves the DVD case around. “Something about a young ninja and the power of spring.”

They watch the movie.  

**Author's Note:**

> My tumblr handle is definitelynotaminion and this was pure practice/stress relief. It's not meant to be anything special.


End file.
